#LOADING THE DATA
file_path <- file.path("Data","NYPD_Arrest_Data__Year_to_Date_.csv") #To make sure the code is going to run for every system
file_path## [1] "Data/NYPD_Arrest_Data__Year_to_Date_.csv"NYPD_Arrest <- read.csv(file = file_path, stringsAsFactors = FALSE) #if the user is using an older version of r #load map
file_path2 <- file.path("Data","geo_export_973a007b-36dc-4dfb-b474-58657b7086be.shp")
ny_map <- sf::st_read(dsn = file_path2)## Reading layer `geo_export_973a007b-36dc-4dfb-b474-58657b7086be' from data source `/Users/anne-gaellesongeons/Downloads/Projects/nypd-arrests-analysis/Data/geo_export_973a007b-36dc-4dfb-b474-58657b7086be.shp'
## using driver `ESRI Shapefile'
## Simple feature collection with 5 features and 4 fields
## Geometry type: MULTIPOLYGON
## Dimension: XY
## Bounding box: xmin: -74.25559 ymin: 40.49613 xmax: -73.70001 ymax: 40.91553
## Geodetic CRS: WGS84(DD)Research Question
On December 14, 2021, future New York City Mayor Eric Adams nominated the first woman and third person of color to head the New York City Police Department: Chief Keechant Sewell. This decision is historic, especially in a tense American context where many have lost confidence in the police. Often accused of being poorly trained, of racism and police violence - we think here of the death of George Floyd in 2020 that shook the United States and the world -, it is a great challenge that awaits the new chief.
We propose in this report to make a point on the activities of the police in the city of New York. For this we will use the data provided by the city of New York. We found a database containing all the arrests of the year 2021 (from January to October) which is available here.
What is the state of NYPD arrests in 2021?
To answer our problem we will analyse into consideration two aspects:
- The daily activities of the policemen
- The profile of the arrested people
Data Description
Our data didn’t need much cleaning, we just detected a problem with missing values. We decided to delete the rows that had at least one missing value. So we go from 115299 rows to 115238 rows.
We have selected the columns that will be useful for our analysis to simplify our dataset and change the values in the ARREST_BORO column.
| ARREST_DATE | OFNS_DESC | LAW_CAT_CD | ARREST_BORO | AGE_GROUP | PERP_SEX | PERP_RACE | Latitude | Longitude |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 09/29/2021 | FELONY ASSAULT | F | Bronx | 25-44 | M | BLACK | 40.82619 | -73.90974 |
| 09/27/2021 | RAPE | F | Brooklyn | 25-44 | M | BLACK | 40.67458 | -73.93022 |
| 09/25/2021 | FELONY ASSAULT | F | Queens | 25-44 | M | BLACK | 40.60344 | -73.76599 |
| 09/25/2021 | ASSAULT 3 & RELATED OFFENSES | M | Bronx | 25-44 | M | BLACK | 40.83778 | -73.91946 |
| 09/25/2021 | ASSAULT 3 & RELATED OFFENSES | M | Bronx | 25-44 | M | BLACK | 40.83599 | -73.91628 |
NYPD Daily Activities
Over the year
On average, the New York Police make 12804 arrests per month over the course of 2021. We note that in April the number of arrests is well below this average, the police made 10421 arrests. It is the month where the least number of arrests was recorded. The possibility that this is related to the Covid health crisis is not to be dismissed.
By Borough
The following graph represents the average number of crimes per month and per neighborhood in New York. There is a great disparity between the neighborhoods of New York in terms of crime. Staten Island is very little concerned where Brooklyn comes first.
This can be correlated to the very different standards of living in the different parts of the city. Staten Island clearly stands out as the richest of the 5 boroughs and the least populated.
Crime and offence
The illegal acts perpetrated are very diverse, we count not far from 63 categories on this year. Police officers are most commonly confronted with third degree assaults and related offenses. This includes, for example, violent attacks on law enforcement, firefighters, and medical personnel. This phenomenon represents 17.3% of arrests.
Where the arrests for assault of third degree took place?
Profile of the arrested people
Age & Sex
Here two things are to be noted: - the majority of criminal acts are perpetrated by men - And the most affected age group is the 25/45 years old
These are the publics with which the police are most in contact. This is interesting information, because it can allow the police to be more attentive to certain types of people but also in order to recreate links to know who to communicate with.
Race
It is noted that nearly half of the people who are arrested in New York City are people from the Black American community. This is all the more alarming considering that in 2020 New York City reported only 15 and 20% of people from this community. There is therefore an overrepresentation of these people.
We can put forward several hypotheses that can explain these figures, such as poverty and difficult social environments in this community, which would lead them to commit more crimes later on, but also we take the discriminations of the police towards these people in particular. These hypotheses remain to be verified with more robust data.
What we have demonstrated above applies to all areas of the city. African American persons are overrepresented.
Conclusion
The challenges of policing in New York are great. We have highlighted in this report that there is a great disparity between New York neighborhoods, and alleged differences in treatment according to ethnicity. This is symptomatic of an America that is more than ever divided on all fronts.
The police, being part of the daily life of its citizens, has here its role to play to make decrease the crime rate in the city. They can indeed play a role of mediator, and recreate social links.